1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to liquid ejection controlling methods and liquid ejection apparatuses.
2. Related Art
An inkjet printer is known as a liquid ejection apparatus. The inkjet printer ejects various colors of ink, cyan (C), magenta (M), yellow (Y) or black (K) for example, onto a medium such as paper. Images are printed on the medium with ejected ink. Such various colors of ink, cyan (C), magenta (M), yellow (Y) or black (K) for example, are separately contained in cartridges mounted to the inkjet printer. When an ink in a cartridge has run out, printing can be resumed by replacing that cartridge with a new cartridge containing the same ink.
As this type of inkjet printer, a printer has been proposed in which a plurality of cartridges that contain the same color of ink are mounted. Specifically, an inkjet printer has been proposed in which two cartridges that contain, black (K) ink for example, can be mounted. It has been proposed in such an inkjet printer to use, when the remaining amount of ink contained in one of the two cartridges that contain the same color of ink has become small, the other cartridge that contains the same color of ink (see JP-A-2003-1842). In addition, a method has also been proposed in which when the remaining amount of ink in a certain cartridge has become small, another cartridge that contains a different color of ink is used as a substitute (see JP-A-2003-291324).
In such an inkjet printer, the computer side, which is a personal computer connected to the inkjet printer for example, makes an inquiry to the inkjet printer from time to time for the remaining amount of ink, so as to check the remaining amount of ink contained in each mounted cartridge. This is because it is necessary for the computer side to generate print data corresponding to the cartridge to be used, when the inkjet printer executes a printing process. That is, when another cartridge is used instead of a cartridge whose remaining amount of ink is small, it is necessary to generate print data reflecting such use of the other cartridge on the computer side.
However, making an inquiry for the remaining amount of ink in each cartridge from the computer side each time the inkjet printer executes the printing process makes the communications between the computer and the inkjet printer complicated, and also may interrupt processes to be performed on the computer side, which is problematic.